


cherry, tells me

by nascar



Series: touchy feely! [1]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: 2 seconds of hyuckhei, 80's AU, Car rides, M/M, Underage Drug Use, Underage Smoking, hyuck is HOT, indrect kisses, mark lee's brain has left the building, no homophobia au haha, spit swapping, that sounds so gross, this is gross but i love enigmatic diva hyuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-07-20 06:29:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16131596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nascar/pseuds/nascar
Summary: Take June seventh, 1986, for example. Madonna’s single Live To Tell went number one on the charts, the pirates draft third baseman Jeff King, and Mark Lee started living, nineteen years into his life.





	cherry, tells me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sunkissing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunkissing/gifts).



> i do not know how this happened!!! sry if theres mistakes but also i dont care abt them

Mark thinks it’s funny, no not funny, maybe odd. Mark thinks it’s odd how a single day can change the world, a country, a town, a person. Everyone wakes up on the same day, completely unaware that this date will be written in a history book some fifty years down the road. 

 

Unsuspecting, unawaiting, like sitting ducks in the timeline of uncountable rotations around the sun. 

 

Take June seventh, 1986, for example. 

 

Madonna’s single Live To Tell went number one on the charts, the pirates draft third baseman Jeff King, and Mark Lee started living, nineteen years into his life. 

 

The day started with a betrayal. Mark’s mother had shoved a wad of ten’s into his hand and grumbled some generalized bullshit about getting out of the house for the day, doing something with himself. 

 

Mark spend the first twenty on a gram and then a ten on the arcade for four hours where Na Jaemin had overdosed two years prior. There was a Pac Man game in his honor with an engraved name plate and everything. It was kind of cool. 

 

Mark spent the rest of the day ducking between air conditioned shops to avoid beach tourists. Cape Diem was smack dab on the west coast. It was a small but reputable beach town nestled on a sand framed inlet surrounded by craggy trees and rocky cliffs. 

 

The name of the place is extremely misleading. One would think a place with have the brainpower to make such a diverting pun as its name would at least be somewhat entertaining. 

 

Instead it’s more of a typical suburban God loving (Amen) town dedicating to serving the lord and crab cakes. 

 

June seventh, 1986 is as hot as hell gets. By the time the sun dips over the horizon Mark feels like the baked fish cakes sold down at the beach vendors. 

 

Mark finds himself spending the rest of his money at a drive-in movie, the air is cool and balmy when he pulls in, the sweat on his forehead is drying and feels kind of like sea wind, but he doesn’t mind much.  

 

About an hour into the Labrynth and David Bowie’s suspiciously shiny tights, the car in front of Mark lurches with shifted weight and he catches sight of bare arms and hands. 

 

With a deep sigh Mark slinks down lower into his seat. There’s just some things the teenagers of this town need to understand about public sex. 

 

After a few more minutes of uncomfortable waiting on Mark’s part, something changes. 

 

The shadowy figures in the car seperate and Mark can hear the vague straining of someone’s angered yelling. Then the slam of a car door. The next thing Mark knows, a shorter, slim boy is stamping across the grass, coming closer and closer to Mark’s car. 

 

Mark, not wanting to be seen as some nineteen year old virgin with a thing for voyeurism, sinks even further in his seat, averting his eyes. 

 

That proves completely useless, Mark soon finds out because tonight is one of those unexpected history nights. A night that changes everything. 

 

Instead of stomping off past Mark’s car and into nothingness, the figure stops, turns towards Mark, pulls the door open, and slides into the passenger seat. 

 

The door closes with an embarrassing clank but the intruder doesn’t seem to notice. Instead he huffs, adjusts his jacket, and casts an expecting look towards Mark. 

 

Maybe alternate-universe-Mark knows what that look is supposed to mean but Current Idiot Mark is only very aware of one thing. 

 

Donghyuck Lee is in Mark’s car. 

 

Donghyuck Lee as in Donghyuck Lee Who Set His Ex Boyfriend’s Car On Fire On The beach. Donghyuck Lee Who’s Kiss Is Said To Taste Like Honey And Grant Immortality. 

 

Mark feels himself shrivelling under the stare of the other boy. 

 

It’s hard to concentrate on normal human social cues when Donghyuck is dressed like  _ that _ . Well Maybe Mark is exaggerating. It’s nothing promiscuous to say the least but the thing is, it’s Donghyuck Lee who’s wearing it. Meaning, it’s the type of look to kick men out of heaven for vice of their stares. 

 

He’s wearing a fitted black t-shirt that hugs his torso just in the right places, stopped short where it tucks into the dark jeans that sit high up on his hips. Over that is a puffy white windbreaker  that seems to engulf him, it’s ownership feels unclear. It’s more likely to belong to whichever poor schmuck lost Donghyuck as a casualty of the night to the depths of Mark’s car. 

 

“Hello?” 

 

Mark’s glazed over eyes snap open frantically. 

 

“Hi?” He wheezes out, hand coming up to touch the back of his neck awkwardly. 

 

Donghyuck rolls his eyes in a way that makes Mark’s legs tremble. 

 

“Can you give me a ride home?” 

 

Mark stares. 

 

Donghyuck stares back, clearly annoyed. He takes his bottom lip between his teeth and chews agitatedly. 

 

It takes Mark the better half of thirty seconds to collect his thoughts and- _ keep his goddamn eyes away from Donghyuck’s lips.  _

 

Then there’s a rapping at the window. A tall figure is ducking down to peer through the cracked window. 

“Hyuckie baby you’re being dramatic.” Mark easily recognizes the voice of Wong Yukhei, star football player and famed “nice guy.” 

 

Donghyuck bites his lip harder and crosses his arms in defiance. 

 

“Donghyuck,” Yukhei’s voice sounds more stained now. His next words sound angry as he grits his teeth. “Come on out of there and let’s talk about this, you’re a big boy right?”

 

Donghyuck tosses and exasperated stare towards Mark who quickly gets the message and sets the ignition revving before slamming into reverse. 

 

Donghyuck doesn’t speak when they pull out of the lot and onto the road. He rests his head against the glass and lets his eyes close enough until his lashes just almost touch his cheeks. He gives Mark his address in a quiet voice unlike the demanding one from earlier. 

 

He sounds tired, and looks exhausted. Mark doesn’t know what Yukhei could have possibly done to warrant Donghyuck’s silent treatment. 

 

In this new light Mark feels kind of sleazy for the way he thought about Donghyuck earlier, sure he was just being a hormonal teenager but something about story-Donghyuck didn’t quite match up with half-asleep-in-Mark’s-car-Donghyuck. 

 

Mark decides to keep the difference to himself. 

 

Sometime along the quiet drive Donghyuck pulls out a pack of cigarettes and rolls the window down. 

 

When Mark looks over at him, the wind is ruffling his hair across his forehead in an endearing way and his cheeks are reddened from the heat. He also catches sight of a few dark bruises and bite marks that disappear under the collar of his (probably stolen slash borrowed) windbreaker. 

 

Mark turns away from him, cheeks flaming and a renewed interest with keeping his eyes on the road. 

 

He unwraps a cherry lollipop from his console to distract himself from the thought of Donghyuck living, breathing, existing next to him.

 

When Mark finally pulls into the sleepy suburban cul de sac Donghyuck has finished his cigarette and tosses the butt out of the window. 

 

They’re silent for another moment. Somewhere in the distance the sound of a motorcycle rips through the quiet town and then dissipates, giving way to the cacophony of crickets. 

 

Donghyuck sits still in his seat, showing no signs of wanting to leave the car but instead starring with an unreadable look up at the modest three story house across the lawn. 

The silence is aching, throbbing, incomprehensibly loud. Mark has never felt anything stronger than the urge to shatter this quiet like a mallet to glass. 

 

“Smoking is bad for you,” Mark blurts, his voice is muffled by the sucker stick resting between his lips.  

 

The Mark Lee from yesterday, from a few hours ago, the Mark Lee before Donghyuck got into this car, howls at the universe for being cursed with such a useless brain. The Mark Lee from before his brain turned to mush denounces God himself for the mess that is Mark’s mind at the moment. 

 

_ Smoking is bad for you. _

 

Of all the things he could have said. 

 

Donghyuck stares at Mark for a moment, there’s an odd expression on his face. He looks kind of judgemental like Mark had thought he would before he’d coughed up this mess of a conversation all over his cheap leather seats and dashboard. 

 

But there’s something else there too, like amusement. Not the teasing kind, but the pure kind. The kind that makes you laugh at serious situations or burst into giggles. 

 

But only, Donghyuck doesn’t burst into giggles at all. 

 

Mark flips the sucker under his tongue nervously, sucking idly at the cherry flavor.

 

Donghyuck eyes the movement with an odd mix of interest and boredom. For a moment they sit just like that, eyeing each other in the dim light. A whiff of the younger boy’s cologne, an agglomeration of fruit and something indistinctly homey drifts under Mark’s nose, carried by the air conditioner. 

 

Then, Donghyuck leans in closer, the cheap leather squeaks a little under the shift in weight and Mark finds it increasingly hard to swallow. 

 

When he’s this close, the smell from earlier is stronger and he can single out the scent of watermelon and honey. In the dark lighting, Mark is just able to make out the details of Donghyuck’s face. The way his bottom lashes kiss the skin of his tender under eyes, and the cascade of sprinkled moles trailing from his cheek down his throat. 

 

Mark’s brain is still light years away from comprehending the growing subtraction of distance between them when Donghyuck’s fingers come into his line of sight. Donghyuck tugs at the stick of the sucker, sliding it past Mark’s tongue and out from between his lips. 

 

Once upon a time Mark was a tangible being, a human of substance, a living being of culture, personality and language. 

 

But right now, Mark is nothing but a buzzing puddle of neuron shortages and  _ want. _

 

Mark’s eyes stay transfixed on the candy in Donghyuck’s fingers, it’s still glistening from Mark’s saliva. 

 

Then, with a move calculated by satan himself, the sucker disappears into Donghyuck’s own mouth, slipping past his pillowy lips and settling on his tongue. 

 

An exhale that sounds oddly like  _ fuck _ chokes itself from Mark’s throat. 

 

Donghyuck’s eyes betray nothing. His face remains expressionless as he twists the sucker under his tongue between his thumb and forefinger and then retrieves it, extending it back towards Mark who obediently pops his lips open. 

 

The sucker is warm and spit slick and would be absolutely disgusting if it wasn’t so  _ hot. _ Because it’s not just spit, it’s Donghyuck Lee’s spit. 

 

_ The _ prettiest boy in Cape Diem. The boy who haunts the town legends with stories of midnight fires and honey kisses. His spit is in Mark’s mouth. 

 

Truthfully, it doesn’t taste like much besides well- spit. And cherry. But Mark likes to think that the very taste of Heaven is ticking under his tongue. That the taste of apple pie and cinnamon spice red hot gum is resting like delicate fire over his mouth. Because of Donghyuck Lee. The Very One And Only Once In A Lifetime Donghyuck Lee. 

 

All minor discrepancies aside, Mark feels like he’s on top of the world. A fucking king of the oceans and Heaven and everything in between. The heartbeat pulsing under the webbing between his thumb and pointer finger is like a real time signature, signing away his heart and state of being to Donghyuck Lee’s tongue, and in return he owns the world. He balls up the earth in his palm and stuffs it away into his windbreaker pocket for safe keeping. 

 

Whole galaxies are exploding under the roof of Mark’s tongue and he knows that his grandchildren will learn of this moment. 

 

Donghyuck though? He just sports that same expression from earlier, not the bored one, but the one that made Mark feel he had a chance. Like really had a chance. Maybe not a chance that mattered, like a permanent residence for his hand in Donghyuck’s back pocket, but a chance like a shared lollipop in the dark of Mark’s tacky convertible. 

 

He doesn’t look like his whole world has been folded into a paper airplane and sent one thousand times around the moon but then again people like Donghyuck don’t feel things like that. 

 

Instead Donghyuck slips his jacket back up his shoulder and presses his palm to the car door latch with one last odd glance at Mark before sidling out of the car and onto the curb. 

 

Maybe there was a thank you in there somewhere, but again, all minor discrepancies. Mark watches Donghyuck’s form disappear into his yard, convincing himself he’s making sure he gets in safe and not just because Donghyuck’s legs look nice and lean from where he’s sitting. 

 

Maybe, it’s a bit of both.

**Author's Note:**

> hii thank u for reading cowboys!  
> heres a couple background things  
> \- hyuck and yukhei got into a fight bc the day before was donghyuck's bday so he's finally 18 and yukhei takes that as an opportunity for them to go further with the physical side in their relationship but hyuck says he isnt ready which sparks a fight abt trust so hyuck is like! "we're on a break i cant deal w u!"  
> \- i love yukhei i dont actually think he's like that i just needed someone to pick on we all know he's a gentleman  
> \- hyucks character was really inspired by the song cherry by chromatics  
> \- i promise mark isnt a creep he's just dealing with a lot of stress and thinks donghyuck is an angel which i might elaborate on in the rest of the series!
> 
> feel free to ask questions! & kudos are always appreciated! mwah <3


End file.
